“Dear Nick c,
This mail is confirmation that you successfully purchased Xbox Live 12 mo. Gold Membership on Sunday, August XX, XXXX.”
I checked my Credit Card bills, saw no charges on it, so I didn’t think much of it. A few days ago, I bought myself a new XBox 360. I fired it up, it asked me about XBox Live, I forgot it had no wireless, then traveled to 5 stores (not kidding) to find an in-stock wireless adapter. I chose the option to recover my gamertag from my previous console. Entered my email address (same one I got the confirmation E-mail to above), and my password, and viola, I had my account back. I went into the membership section, and activated my 13 month Xbox Live Subscription Card I just purchased. After I did this, I went into the “payments” section and I see my credit card stored there, as well as another persons.
Apparently, I made a mistake when I sold my Xbox, and forgot to turn off the “auto sign-in” feature, and it stored my password to the HD. With this feature, you can’t modify/edit any account information without the password, but you can add Credit Cards (go figure…). The guy who bought my XBox decided to use MY Xbox Live Account for himself instead of creating a new one. This is probably because I had a few months remaining on my old XBox Live Gold Subscription, and he wanted to use it instead of paying for a new one for himself.
I decide that this is probably a good time to call Microsoft to sort out the mess. I spoke to the front-line rep for maybe 3-4 minutes, where he promptly told me he was confused, and that he needed to transfer me to his supervisor. Someone named “Kerry” got on the phone to try and help me. She first looked me up by my last name, then read off the names of my parents. I asked her why she had their names, and she said they have Hotmail Accounts (scary). I explained the situation, she asked for more personal information from me, puts me on hold, comes back and said there’s nothing she could do for me because I couldn’t “verify” all the account information.
This is where the call started to go downhill. Of course, I politely asked which information was incorrect, so I could give it to her again. She said she couldn’t tell me, because that’s against their supposed privacy policy. I asked her if I could repeat all the information I had given to her again, in case it was put down incorrectly. She said no, she couldn’t do that. Again, referring to her privacy policy. I asked where this privacy policy was so she could point it out, and she started to raise her voice and said, “SIR, I LEARNED THIS IN TRAINING.” I had my Xbox Live account open in front of me, and I had access to ALL of the information on file–my old address (parent’s house), phone, etc, so there is no way I could have given her wrong information. The only thing I couldn’t verify, was the Credit Card # of the person who used to buy points.
I explained the situation again, and she started to argue and talk over me saying she already explained the situation. I had a hard time disconnecting the call, because I was so flabbergasted by the ineptitude of their customer service. I was so upset, I asked for some personal information from here. I started by asking for her last name (I know people rarely give that, but some companies have pseudonyms) or phone extensions. She was continuing to raise her voice, and said it’s against the rules to give that out. Finally, I asked for the location of the call center, again, she told me it’s against the privacy policy to give that out. I started to laugh at this point, she’s claiming their privacy policy states they can’t give out the physical location of their call center.
At this point, I asked to talk to her supervisor, and she told me she is the supervisor. I asked if she reports to anyone, and she said “no.” At this point, I was annoyed, so I decided to have some fun. At this point, I clarified that she ran the entire department, and was in an executive position. She said “no”, then I asked who she reported to again. She again told me that she is the boss. One more time, I asked if she was the director, or higher of the call center, and she said “no”. She finally told me her supervisor doesn’t talk to consumers. I asked how she gets feedback from her supervisor, and she said, “I don’t” then said, “If you don’t have more question, I’m disconnecting” and before I could even say anything, she hung-up. Well Kerry, it’s just like you said, it’s perfectly clear that you don’t get any feedback from your supervisor.
Where does that leave everything? Well, there’s an Xbox Live account that contains all of my personal information, my stored Credit Card, a stored Credit Card for another person, and my recently added Xbox Live Subscriptoin. Microsoft knows about this, and choses to do nothing to rectify the problem. Go figure.
*EDIT* It’s not possible to remove Credit Card #’s from an Xbox Live Account. Here’s an interesting story on the matter. Click here.
Here’s a quote:
I gotta tell you, nothing is more frustrating than calling a company’s support only to be told that they can’t and won’t help you … Oh so sorry, but you are screwed!
I’ve never been mad at Microsoft or their support until that call. And you know what bloggers do when they get mad … they blog.
**Edit #2** After attempting to resolve the situation again–unsuccessfully. I decided to return the console to the store.
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